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THREE
MARCONI UNION
While snarfing down my burger and sipping my malt, I googled Nightingale Investigations and Security.
And discovered how I knew Kai Mason.
He was Stella Gunn’s husband. That being Stella Gun, lead singer and guitarist of the Blue Moon Gypsies, award-winning, multi-platinum, cool-as-all-hell rock band. I’d seen him in dozens of pictures by her side when she went to award ceremonies and such.
He was also a celebrity in his own right, being a top-notch snowboarder who turned into an equally successful surfer.
This somehow segued into him being the owner of the most sought-after celebrity security firm in LA, providing security for such stars as Viola Remington, Dee-Amond and Imogen Swan.
However, recently, his business, MTS Security of LA, had merged with Nightingale Investigations of Denver, whereupon NI had become NI&S, and as Mace told me, they’d expanded to open an office in the Valley of the Sun.
He and Stella had some book written about them, so I bought the eBook but left it and clicked through all the stuff about Nightingale Investigations.
The guy who owned it, Liam Nightingale, also had a book written about him. But that was probably the least fascinating thing about him, his firm and his superhero-esque crew.
I mean, they made the Denver news more than the Hemsworth brothers made international. And an image search showed me Nightingale’s crew made those Aussie boys look just plain.
I know, it sounded crazy, but it was all kinds of true.
I guessed they were going to go with the same hiring strategy down here in Phoenix, if Cap and Mace were anything to go by.
I sucked the last dregs of the malt down, even if I was lamenting my addition of the tots. My belly was so full (who was I kidding, the malt was enough, I shouldn’t have ordered the burger either) and headed to my tiny bathroom to run a bath.
My Citadel was under attack. The parapets were shaking. I should have known, with what happened that night, even a vanilla malt wasn’t going to be able to tame the onslaught.
I needed a bath bomb, bubbles, a face mask and some candles.
Moving through my apartment, which was also tiny (living room up front, bar beyond which was a U-shaped kitchen, hall with bath to one side, laundry closet to the other, lone bedroom at the back), I sorted that all out.
Cueing up Marconi Union’s “Weightless” on my Bluetooth speaker, I got in the bath, spread the sheet mask on my face and sat back in the warm water, the foam moving in to cocoon me.
I should have known it wasn’t going to work.
And it didn’t.
Five minutes in, I was curled into a ball, face shoved against my knees, shoulders heaving, the nameMacy, Macy, Macy, Macy, Macyechoing in my head.
I huddled in my Citadel as the arrows flew and the cannons boomed, and it took me a while to get there. To be able to do what my counselor taught me to do, one of many things I tried, the only thing that worked (sometimes).
I anchored myself where I was. I felt the warm water. Listened to the music. Smelled my tobacco cedarwood candles. Felt the cool mask still clinging to my face.
And I reminded myself I was Rachel “Raye” Armstrong, with emphasis on the “strong.”
I’d navigated the trauma and made it here to this place.
And I was safe.
Now.
In my bath.
But also, in my life.
Alive. Breathing.
